Richard Cory (Robinson, set by J. Duke, C. Naginski, P. James, P. Reif) (The Lied and Art Song Texts Page: Texts and Translations to Lieder, mélodies, canzoni, and other classical vocal music)


Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored and imperially slim. 

And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good morning," And he glittered when he walked. 

And he was rich, yes richer than a king,
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish we were in his place. 

So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.

Authorship

Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935)

The Children of the Night

Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive)

John Woods Duke (1899-1984)

Four Poems by Edwin Arlington Robinson

Philip Frederick Wright James (1890-1975)

Charles Naginski (1909-1940)

Paul Reif (1910-1978)

Added to the website between May 1995 and September 2003.

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